my tank crashed what do i do now
- Thread starter chris l
- Start date
attml
Active Member
How long was the tank set up before it crashed and what did you have in it? This may sound stupid but do you know what caused the crash? (overcrowding, high nitrites nitrates or ammonia, something potentially poisonous died and went toxic?) I know you are probably pretty bummed but any background on your tank would be helpful!
chris l
Member
attml........yes I do know what caused it. I was on vacation and sometime during the week the gfci outlet tripped and shut power off to the tank. The bad thing about it, I told the lady who was watching my pets not to worry about the tank everything would be fine. I lost everything except 4 blue legs. Corals I had were........7 sps frags, 1 acro colony (which I grew from a frag) bubble coral, hammer coral, several mushrooms colonys, black and orange sun corals and some other softies. Two maxima clams. Tank has been set up for almost 2 years.
Now some other questions.......I am going to set the tank up again but I would guess the live sand and rock should be tossed or can I save the rock and just scrub it with fresh water? Any advise from anyone would be greatly appeciated.
Now some other questions.......I am going to set the tank up again but I would guess the live sand and rock should be tossed or can I save the rock and just scrub it with fresh water? Any advise from anyone would be greatly appeciated.
nm reef
Active Member
I would think the LR/LS could be saved. Maybe just re-start as if you were setting up a new system. It'll likely cycle due to the ammonia present...but it will eventually settle back down and be ready for introduction of livestock. I'd be highly up-set if the same sort of problem destroyed my reef. There is a ton of time and money invested...
You may want to rinse/clean off the LR especially if there is a lot of algae present....best of luck recovering from you loss...keep us posted as you recover.
NMREEF website
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You may want to rinse/clean off the LR especially if there is a lot of algae present....best of luck recovering from you loss...keep us posted as you recover.
“Whiskey for my men...beer for my horses.”
nmreef@cox.net
chris l
Member
Not much of any algae on the lr. Do you think I can just drain all of my water clean out all decaying coral, clams etc and just leave the lr and ls in the tank fill it back full of water and start over.
Another thing........looks like my grape culerpa in my refugium is o.k. and I see pods in there swimming around. Can I save this? Thanks!!
Another thing........looks like my grape culerpa in my refugium is o.k. and I see pods in there swimming around. Can I save this? Thanks!!
leigh
Active Member
I would try to avoid starting completely over. Remove anything dead/decaying. Run carbon for a while. Do a series of med-large (20%) water changes. And keep testing your water params. In a few weeks everything will likely settle down (probably even faster than you think). Sorry 'bout your bad luck
sdascher
Member
This is what I did when my power went out and mine crashed!! Removed all dead animals and tired to account for them all. I never found one starfish, but I did find all others. I drained out approx. 20% of the water - put any crabs/snails that made it through the horror in a bucket along with all of my plants, with water. I then took out all of the rock and one by one swished them around in a clean bucket of saltwater so that any caught dead inverts would come out - did a quick inspection and got the rock back into the tank. Added the inverts, plants, topped off the tank and within a couple of days I had all normal readings. Just a pretty much empty tank!! I hope that this helps........
leigh
Active Member
is it possible to post a picture so we can really see how bad it is? obviously remove all floating dead bristle worms. I guess it's possible everything in the sand bed is dead, I just find it unlikely since you said a small part of your clean up crew survived. but anyhow, i see you've posted for bang guy--and he really is the expert--so frankly i'd say do whatever he tells you to do.
chris l
Member
leigh.....I do very much appreciate your advice I just need to get this rolling and am trying anyway possible. I can't take a pic. no digi cam. I do have about 10 blue legs and 5 or 6 different snails that survived. Like I said please don't take the post for Bang the wrong way I just need advice quick. The reason being I have had a balli slimmer(SPS frag) floating in my sons tank (which is no where near ready to be a reef) for 2 days now and need to get it out of the bag into something to at least give it some chance of life. So I figured if I can get my tank into operation it might have a slim chance. THANK YOU VERY MUCH for you responses.
leigh
Active Member
also have you started doing a series of large-ish (20%) water changes. Your crash was 2 days ago right? If so you could've changed 40% by now with 2 20% changes, I'd imagine that should get rid of all floaties! And no, I'm definitely not offended by you posting for Guy--he knows his stuff--I'd do the same thing if I were you. The thing is if you disturb your dsb you are pretty much committing to re-cycling the tank completely which means a month for your sps frag--i think if you can avoid messing with the dsb too much you'll help minimize any cycle and be able to get your frag in your tank sooner rather than later. I assume you can't get your lfs to hold onto the frag for you for a lil while?